Ford Performance Notes and Quotes
NASCAR Cup Series
Ford Zoom Media Availability | Tuesday, August 10, 2021
JONATHAN HASSLER, Crew Chief, No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Mustang — WHAT IS THIS WEEK LIKE FOR YOU GOING BACK TO INDIANAPOLIS MOTOR SPEEDWAY? “The biggest focus, honestly, has been the change to the racetrack and trying to be ready to go and run the road course. It will obviously be my first race at the speedway as a crew chief, so I’ll try to definitely take care of my family and make sure they all have the opportunity to go. I made it pretty clear to all of them, but the task at hand is the race and I’m gonna be pretty into that. They can go to the race and have a good time, but I’m all business for the weekend.”
IF THE 21 TEAM DOES NOT MAKE THE PLAYOFFS, WHAT DOES THAT 10-RACE STRETCH AT THE END SYMBOLIZE FOR YOU PROFESSIONALLY? “For me professionally, I don’t think it’s anything different than the last few weeks. Obviously, we’ve been trying to get a win for Matt and still through the rest of the year we’re trying to get that 100th win for the Wood Brothers. I think the goal doesn’t really change a lot for me personally. We’re just trying to put the best race cars together we can each week, improve from one week to the next and let the results and the outcomes from the results kind of take care of themselves.”
HAS THERE BEEN ANY HARSH REALIZATION FOR YOU ABOUT THE INTRICACIES OF THE CUP SERIES YOU HAVE NOW LEARNED AND MADE YOU A BETTER CREW CHIEF? “I don’t want to jinx myself, but, honestly I feel like things have really rolled pretty smoothly. I’ve been in this sport basically 15 years. I’ve worked with a lot of different crew chiefs and they’ve all sort of played their part in preparing me along the way and I think so far the ride has been pretty smooth.”
HOW MANY FAMILY MEMBERS WILL YOU HAVE THIS WEEKEND? “Honestly, we’ve gotten almost 25. I’ve got my wife’s family from Zionsville. I’m from Greencastle, so I’ve got about 15 of my family and about 10 of her family coming to watch the race.”
WHEN WAS THE FIRST TIME YOU WENT TO THE SPEEDWAY AS A KID AND WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR MEMORIES AND HIGHLIGHTS THERE? “Personally, growing up what I remember the most is we went to qualifying the year of the inaugural Brickyard and then as a family that was our deal. We’d go to qualifying every year and hang out around the garage and try and get as close to the drivers as we could. Obviously, professionally we were able to win the race with Brad in 2018, so that was a huge accomplishment.”
WHERE DO YOU FEEL YOU HAVE MADE AN IMPACT WITH HOW YOU’RE PREPARING CARS AND DOING THINGS WHEN YOU COME INTO A SITUATION LIKE THIS IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SEASON? “To your point, I’d say the core of the race car is built four to six weeks ahead of time, so there is only so much you can change leading up to the race, so I would say honestly these next few weeks are really the first cars that I’ve had some hand on the car all the way through the process. In terms of calling the race and having an impact on Matt, obviously that was sort of the immediate.”
HOW MUCH HAS CHANGED IN TERMS OF THE CARS WITH YOU HAVING MORE OF A HAND ON THINGS? “At Team Penske we keep our cars through our company fairly similar, so it’s not like I have my car, but I feel like I’ve been able to see all the different ideas and all the different options for how we can build our car and kind of voice my input. There have certainly been times along the way where the rest of the organization has been on board and there has been times where maybe my ideas were a little bit outside of the box and I use the experience of the rest of the company to maybe get reigned back in.”
IS THERE A ROAD COURSE YOU CAN COMPARE THE INDY ROAD COURSE TO? “Honestly, I think Indy is gonna be pretty unique. It maybe shares some characteristics of COTA in that there’s a lot of left and right switchbacks. It has some similarities maybe to Road America with some really big braking zones. It’s definitely unique in that it’s completely flat. We don’t have any other road courses that are like that, so I think you’re gonna see something a little bit different than what we’ve seen so far this year.”
HAVE TEAMS BUILT SPECIAL CARS FOR THIS RACE? “I would think most teams are using cars they’ve ran earlier in the year.”
HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE THE VIBE OF THE TEAM SINCE THE ANNOUNCEMENT THAT HARRISON WILL BE IN THE CAR NEXT YEAR? “I think there was a day or two in there that for everybody was kind of tense, and I think there was a little bit of the team trying to really understand how Matt was gonna be in the car. We got off to a really good start and I don’t think anybody wanted to see things slow down with that announcement. We were hopeful that they wouldn’t and I think, knock on wood, things after the announcement have kept going really strong, and I think everybody has eyes out front and focused on finishing strong and getting that 100th win for the Wood Brothers.”
YOU’VE FINISHED 10TH, 9TH, 11TH and 11TH THE LAST FOUR RACES. ARE YOU IN THAT MODE WHERE YOU RUN TOP 10 AND THEN FOCUS ON TOP FIVE AND THEN PUTTING YOURSELF IN POSITION FOR A WIN? “That’s 100 percent where we’re at. I said it once coming in that I really believe that that’s the case. Top 15, top 10, top 10, top 5 and when you’re in the top 5 if you do it enough times things will play out and you’ll have the opportunity for a win. That’s been the approach and I think we’re creeping up on it.”
I ASSUME WITH YOUR POSITION IN THE POINTS THAT GAMBLING AND DOING SOMETHING DIFFERENT TO TRY AND WIN IS ALWAYS OPEN, RIGHT? “Yeah, we’re definitely open to doing something that gives us the opportunity late in the race for the win. We’re always making moves even I would say early in the race hopefully that might set us back momentarily, but will put us in the best position to grab a win later.”
IT’S THE SAME TIRE AS COTA AND ROAD AMERICA. HOW IS THE FALL OFF WITH THIS TIRE? “I think there’s a couple pieces in that equation. There’s definitely the tire itself and then there’s the surface. I think Indianapolis has tended to be reasonably abrasive, so I would expect some fall off, maybe not the level that we had at Road America. Fortunately, though, we’ll get practice this week and definitely have some idea going in what we’re gonna have.”
DID THIS ROLE CHANGE TAKE YOU OUT OF ANY WORK YOU WERE DOING WITH NEXT GEN OR PUT YOU MORE INVOLVED WITH IT? “I’d say I’ve taken a step back in the Next Gen development, but fortunately in the Penske organization there’s a lot of good people and while I don’t have my hands in it directly, I’m certainly able to monitor what’s going on there, so I still feel like we’ll be in a really good position as we transition to that car.”
